Enjoy the first in a series celebrating the first 10 years of GRAND-AM Road Racing, leading up to the series' 10th anniversary at the 2010 Rolex 24 At Daytona.
A packed field took the start of the Rolex 24 in 2000. (LAT) » More Photos
A new era in American sports car competition dawned with the new millennium, when the Grand-Am Road Racing Association debuted with the running of the 2000 Rolex 24 At Daytona.
American sports car racing was at its nadir. The USRRC, the sanctioning body for the Rolex 24, folded only three races into its second year of existence. To sanction the Rolex 24, a new independent series - with the strong support of NASCAR and the International Speedway Corporation - was announced in September 1999 in New York City.
The Rolex 24 opened a 10-race schedule and featured five classes. Leading the competition was the SR (Sports Racer Prototypes), with a prototype class for smaller engine cars, SRP II, debuting in round two at Phoenix. In addition, there were three GT classes - GTO, GTU and AGT.
The new sanctioning body had several unique rules. The qualifying driver was also required to start the event. There was a four-driver limit for each car, with teams forbidden to switch drivers from car to car. A team was no longer allowed to switch a driver to its leading car during an event - so that driver could share in the victory.
Ron Fellows, shown here in the #3 Corvette, would learn a lot in the early stages of their program while gunning for the dominant ORECA Dodge Vipers. (LAT) » More Photos
Problems with the lead class quickly became apparent at the season-opening Rolex 24. The entry had 17 SR cars - including a pair of Cadillac LMPs with a driver lineup including Wayne Taylor and Max Angelelli - but attrition quickly decimated that class. Midway through the race - with the failure of the Taylor Cadillac - James Weaver, Max Papis, Elliot Forbes-Robinson and Rob Dyson held a 27-lap lead in their Riley and Scott Ford. Then, that car slowly began to lose time due to a bent exhaust valve, and the leading GTO Vipers and Corvettes whittled into the lead, a few seconds per lap.
The Team Oreca Dodge Viper took the lead with two hours remaining and battled the lead Corvette for the remainder of the event, winning by 30.878 seconds - the closest finish in Rolex 24 history. Taking third was the second Oreca Viper, with a driver lineup including David Donohue, while the Dyson car struggled home fourth, six laps back. Andy Wallace finished second in SR, 80 laps back in the 13th-place Cadillac.
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The schedule included the return of two traditional races, the Paul Revere 250 at Daytona and the Six Hours of Watkins Glen. The schedule included "rovals" at Phoenix, Homestead and Daytona, traditional circuits at Lime Rock, Mid-Ohio, Road America and Watkins Glen, and a street race at Trois-Rivieres. The Watkins Glen season finale also included a pair of points-paying qualifying races on Saturday, with the prototype race called early in total darkness.
Weaver went on to win five additional races to secure the inaugural GRAND-AM SR championship. Doran Racing's Didier Theys won a pair of races in a Judd-powered Ferrari to finish second, followed by Jack Baldwin, a two-time winner for Robinson Racing.
Cadillac would debut their Riley-built prototypes at the Rolex 24 a decade ago. (LAT) » More Photos
Mike Johnson's Archangel Motorsports dominated SRP II, winning six of nine races with Larry Oberto and Ryan Hampton at the wheel.
Terry Borcheller and Ron Johnson joined the series at Phoenix, winning seven races in the Saleen Allen Speedlab Ford Mustang. It was not as easy as it sounds, though, with the team recovering from three fires.
G&W Motorsports (later Synergy Racing) won the GTU title, with Mike Fitzgerald and Darren Law winning six races and finishing second three times in a Porsche GT3R. However, the teammates did not share the title because they drove different cars in the Rolex 24. Fitzgerald finished third, and captured the title, while Law drove a different car and took 16th and went on to place second in the final points.
Third in the championship was Kevin Buckler, who had four podium finishes in the Racer's Group Porsche.
The Spirit of Daytona, running its first full season, dominated American GT competition but lost the championship. Doug Goad and Craig Conway won six races and finished second three times to dominate competition, but scored no points in their Lime Rock victory due to a pit miscalculation.
After a number of crashes and mechanical woes depleted the prototype ranks, the fast and reliable ORECA Viper took overall honors at the 2000 Rolex 24. (LAT) » More Photos
Doug Mills started the season with a Rolex 24 victory with Comer Racing, and hitch-hiked to the title by joining three different teams in the last four races, finishing second in the Watkins Glen finale with Jon "Chevy" Leavy.
The new sanctioning body crowned its champions on the evening of the Watkins Glen Bosch Summerfest, using a tent in the infield of the upstate New York circuit.
